The Fine Line [Paperback]

Eviatar Zerubavel (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 1993 | ISBN-10: 0226981592 | ISBN-13: 978-0226981598

Eviatar Zerubavel argues that most of the distinctions we make in our daily lives and in our culture are social constructs. He questions the notion that a clear line can be drawn to separate one time or object or concept from another, and presents witty and provocative counterexamples in defense of ambiguity and anomaly.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

People carve reality into discrete mental slices, "islands of meaning"; they categorize, classify and label. This tendency, according to Zerubavel, can lead to the rigid mind that detests ambiguity. Stereotypes are born as the rigid mind lumps together "the poor" or "Orientals." In a lucid, brilliantly original look at the way we compartmentalize reality, the author, a Rutgers sociology professor, uses fundamental insights into humans' boundary-drawing habits to illumine the sense of self, taboos, xenophobia, aversion to bodily discharges, sex, daily rituals, the need for privacy, humor and modern art's blurring of the distinction between art and life. Without using jargon, he crams in a wealth of phenomena, from wedding ceremonies to children's oceanic, fluid mindset which he places on a continuum with mythical thought and psychosis. Readers will edge closer toward attaining a "flexible mind" that avoids freezing reality into any one mental context. Illustrations.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Kirkus Reviews

A witty, tightly written, and well-integrated look at our eternal struggles between order and chaos and the need to find a practical medium. Since the time the Creator in Genesis divided light from dark, Zerubavel (Sociology/Rutgers) says, we have continued to follow His example by structuring our own lives into territories, partitions, classes, and other ``discrete islands of meaning'' that are both comforting and constricting. This is especially true when such demarcations as white and black, Gentile and Jew, or homosexual and heterosexual pose more trouble than they are worth. Growing up in Israel during the 1950's, Zerubavel witnessed firsthand humanity's ``inordinate preoccupation with boundaries'' that are often self- imposed illusions. Here, he suggests ways we can ease our common ``fear of dissolving'' by being more tolerant of ambiguities and striking a compromise ``between the ocean and the bathtub.'' It therefore makes sense that his writing takes ``quantum leaps across mental divides'' with a ``gelatinous'' meld of psychology, theology, literature, theater, art, math, zoology, and even embryology in an attempt to help us open our ``ossified mental cages.'' He examines, for example, the open-ended criteria separating man from ape, the ambiguous civil rights of fetuses, and the multiple meanings behind Freudian slips, and offers ingenious analyses of iconoclasts such as M.C. Escher, Jorge Luis Borges, and Lewis Carroll--all of whom, Zerubavel says, challenged the ``solid entities'' of time and space. A bright overview unafraid to glean the beauty in ``blurred- edge essences'' and to expose the hazards of the rigid mind when nature prefers ``twilight zones.'' -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: University Of Chicago Press (October 1, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0226981592
• ISBN-13: 978-0226981598
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #605,050 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It is a good book, February 19, 2007

By 

Rodica "Rody" (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Fine Line (Paperback)

I enjoyed reading this book. It is about the everyday distinctions we make in our life. Zerubavel talks about how we always arrange things and how we become dependent of this order. He shows that our whole world is divided by our mind into islands. that is because we can't understand the world as a whole without dividing it into smaller pieces. Also he talks about the three types of minds: rigid mind, fluid mind and flexible mind.

In rigid mind he talks about how the rigid mind can't accept new things and different things in his life. I guess this is the problem of many people in our world people who can't adjust easily to different life conditions and to different people from themselves. We always tend to create our small groups of people who share the same ideas and the same ways of life. For this people is impossible to accept a different kind of life and different ways of life. It is due to our rigidity that we had wars in the past and we still have today. It is due to our rigidity that there is still so much intolerance in our world. There are people who still make distinctions between black and white people, between men and women and so on.

Thank you